Turbo's Second Ride
by Elliot Pole
Summary: Yusei and Crow stop at an aracde in North Dakota. While Crow gets absorbed playing a game where a guy with a hammer fixes windows, Yusei plays other games, eventually arriving at Turbo II, a game in which the player tries to keep a game character from taking over the arcade...


**Turbo's Second Ride**

**Chapter One**

"Hey, check out that place," Crow said, as he and Yusei parked their motorcycles outside a diner. Next to the diner was an arcade called Litwick's Games and More.

"Looks rather old-fashioned," Yusei said.

"Of course it looks old-fashioned," said Crow. "We're lookinga t it from the outside. Come on."

Both of them went into the arcade. Yusei didn't know why he agreed to a cross-country drive on a motocyle if Crow was just going to drag him into every gaming joint in North Dakota.

"Look at that one," Crow said, pointing to a game with ancient graphics. Yusei stared at its name. _Fix-It Felix, Jr._

"Couldn't we play something a bit more modern?" Yusei asked. "Like that one over there?" He pointed to a game with the title _Heavy Duty _etched in yellow letters with black background.

"Please, Yusei. That's not modern. It's got to be at least ten-years-old."

"Came out in 2008 in fact," said a store clerk. "So it's about twelve years old, now."

"Is it good?" Yusei asked.

"Wouldn't be around if it weren't. Though that game might have to be thrown out," he said, gesturing toward the one Crow was lookingover. "Only eight people have played it in the last five years. We've got to make room for _Kingdom Hearts: Exploudred_."

""Isn't that a crossover?" Crow asked.

"Why not?"

"I didn't know Square Enix and Disney bought their rights to Pokemon."

"Disney owns everything," the store clerk said, sighing. "Today tghey bought out Harry Potter from J.K. Rowling. It'll be a joy to see the seven inevitable Albus Potter movies." He said this in a joyless voice.

"Look, Crow, you can play that archaic washout of a game if you want," Yusei said. "I'm playing _Hero's Duty_."

"You're wacko," Crow said. He took a quarter and slipped in the slot on the side of _Fix-It Felix, Jr. _"Wow, this machine still costs only a quarter to play! It must be forty years old or something!"

"The poliy we have at Litwick's formerly Litwak's, is that we always charge whatever price the game cost players to play when we annexed it. We think of games as states here, see? Seventy-four states. Ra-ra."

The store clerk shoved off to speak to other gamers. Yusei went up to _Heavy Duty _and shrieked. "$2.95 for a game! What a rip-off!"

"You can either get a nickel back for athree-dollar bill, or watch me play this," Crow said. "There's this really cool wrecking gy here and I control this puny, unkmuuscled dude with a hammer…it must be a magic hammer…oh yes, there it is 'inherited from his grandfather.' Man, this game rocks, Yusei!"

Yusei wasn't listening. He had decided that a round of _Hero's Duty_ was worth three-quid after all. Even if that was a fourth of a paycheck.

He fired up the game and found himself controlling an army. He had to switch shooters really fast to hit a lobunch of creatures called cybugs. He actually had a little trouble with this, because he had an abnormal fear of insects. Whatever the phobia name for that was.

There was a female commander, which he wasn't used to. Most of the army games he had played before had male leaders. She was tough stuff, too, slapping her own comrades when they disobeyed orders. He wished Akiza were like that, instead of a sel-conscious girl who had trouble getting out of her shell, even though they had been through so much together. He had really thought that defeating Yilaster would solve her issues, but it hadn't.

Yusei got killed by a giant cybug and leapt out of the seat. He turned around and saw the most amazing racing game that some kid was playing. It was called _Sugar Rush_.

"Can I have a go?" he asked the kid.

"Go play something for someone your own age," the boy said. He muttered the words "old man" under his breath as Yusei walked away.

Yusei wanted to smack him, but he knew he'd get thrown out. Besides, he had just spotted another game, much more recent. _Sugar Rush _had to have been gotten a decade before, but this game looked brand new.

"How come no one's playing that game?" Yusei asked the store-clerk.

"It's a real challenge, and gamers these days just don't have the patience."

"It looks pretty rad. Maybe I'll have a go."

"You ought to be told that the objective of that game is to conquer all the games in an arcade like this. They are all have the theme of racing, which is not trueu of any self-respecting arcade, but in the gaming world, all kin s of shenagians can exist. Sometimes I even wonder if these game characters have a party after everyone goes home and the place is closed for the day…"

"Um, about that game?"

"Yes, sorry, didn't mean to go off like that. Well, best of luck with it."

The store clerk turned to go when Yusei called him back. "I don't see the title written anywhere. What's it called?"

"_Turbo II_. And it's not written on there because we are afraid it might be jinxed, if it's name is written on it."

"Why?'

"There was some hoopla back in the mid-90's, where a character from the game called _Turbo_—a space-packed racing module—ended up in another racing game, which wwas natural without space but the actual road and real sports cars. It was before dueling on motorcycles became commonplace."

"You don't approve of Duel Runners, sir?"

"I would if they were in a video game," the cleark said. "But back in my day, the roads were safe. No holograms fo monsters in the streets Everything was peachy and fine."

"It would be cool if there were Duel Runners in _Turbo II_."

"Oh, there are. It's one of the games you have to conquer. Unfrotunately," the clerk said, patting the side of the deck, "you are only given a basic deck, and the game uses a mass-destruction, multi-Synchro Summoning in one turn while still summoning chaos monsters deck."

"That's a lot of hyphens."

"You live, you learn." The store clerk started walking away before he turned around and said, "Good luck. You'll be desperate for it shortly after you begin that game."

Yusei looked at the price for _Turbo II_ "Eight dollars! You've got to be kidding me!"

He ran toward where Crow was, still intent on _Fix-It Felix, Jr. _"Hey, Crow, can I borrow five bucks?"

Crow handed him a Polaoid of five male deer grazing in a pasture, not losing a moment punching buttons on the game's dashboard.

"Ha-ha, very funny. I mean five dollars," Yusei said.

Crow handed him an Abraham Lincoln while shouting, "If I ever get this hammer to do damage, Ralph, rather than fixing everything, you'll pay in more than being thrown off a building."

Yusei was ready to give up on him. Crow as so absorbed in that pieace of junk with awaful graphics. It was a wonder that they hadn't thrown it out yet.

He put in the Lincoln along with a thre-dollar bill of his own. The United States had recently coined the three-dollar bill after some video-game character won the 2012 election. The rights to that characters were bought by the government, who pasted her image on the new piece of money. Ironically, the three-dollar bill was worth about as much as a one-dollar bill used to be. Minimum wage was now twelve dollars an hour, which sounded like more money to people who somehow blocked out the fact that it was the equivalent of earning $4.00 an hour. Inflation was somehothing Yusiei hated. OfH ewould have thought that defeating Yilaster and saving the world would have gotten him a better job than working at a burger joint, but no. It was like every store had a sign on it saying, "NOT HIRING HEROES, SORRY." Maybe if he beat this game, he could work here. The pay had to be better than at Cheese Lots, which served their food in car-shaped containers but didn't have a drive-thru.

He started the game, and screamed. A spider had jus just bitten him.

The sotre clerk ran over.

"Kill it!" Yusei exclaimed.

"It's not something that can be killed," the store clerk said. "It's part of the game."

"You're saying the game just bit me?"

"Yes. That's what's supposed to happen."

"All right, I'm outta here," Yusei said, trying to get out of his seat. But the belt wouldn't unbuckle.

"You can't stop playing until you lose," the store clerk said.

"What kind of game is this, anyhow?"

"Play it and find out."

Yusei only hada second to choose his vehicle before the timer went off. He got…a taxicab.

"I'm supposed to race around in a taxi?"

"Have you never seen how fast cabs move in the streets? They're like jets!"

"Okay, mister, you've been cooped up in this place too long. There's no speed in these awful yellow cars."

"Woudn't want to be you, then."

The store clerk walked away as Yusei scowled. Then he saw his competiton. A bulldozer, a tractor, a station-wagon, and a bicycle. He could win this with ease.


End file.
